Former Senator Set To Marry Male Partner 50 Years His Junior

By: Katrina Manning | April 27, 2016

Former senator Harris Wofford, 90, revealed that he is set to marry his male partner Matthew Charlton, 40. Wofford lost his wife of 48 years, Clare Lindgren, to lukemia in 1996. In an op-ed for The New York Times, Wofford shared that he never thought he would find love again. Wofford was a Pennsylvania senator from 1991 to 1995.

He was also an adviser to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. When John F. Kennedy Jr. was running for the White House, he recruited Wofford to help him win "the Negro vote." Wofford writes in the Times that he met his wife Clare while serving in the U.S. Air Force during the Second World War. They married in 1948, and they had three children. She even gave up her job to become his campaigner, "best critic" and "best friend."

Wofford wrote, "Our romance and adventure continued for five decades." Five years after Clare's death, Wofford met interior decorator and furniture designer, Matthew Charlton, by chance when swimming off a beach in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Wofford and Charlton are set to be married on April 30.

Wofford also writes, "Too often, our society seeks to label people by pinning them on the wall — straight, gay or in between. I don’t categorize myself based on the gender of those I love. I had a half-century of marriage with a wonderful woman, and now am lucky for a second time to have found happiness."